Why I Spent $20,000 On My Small Band's IEM Rig

[@KeyanHoushmandLive]

Thank you for watching! If you guys want to see a Part 2 to go over the software side of our IEM mixes and how we set up our tracks, let me know in the comments below! Links to all the gear are listed in the description

[@bparr6968]

1000% make a PT2 please! I run a Mac with Reaper setup for the backing/click/IEM and I just know you'll have thought of things I wont have.

[@jacobjaeger23]

Yes do a pt2!

[@ShreddingDragon]

Very interested in seeing part 2 with the software side of things!

[@snm1147]

Yes! Would love more videos on those cable management specially on those iem adapter power cable management. There are not many videos on cable management for IEM Rigs.

[@HoaPierre]

yes pls

[@rizkimulyadi40]

Please make a video how you got the $20.000 for spending to this rig..

[@Metallllllll667]

maybe he has rich parents. Or maybe in Australia it`s not very much, idk

[@rizkimulyadi40]

@@Metallllllll667 hahha, i wish i had that life

[@Metallllllll667]

@@rizkimulyadi40 same, dude

[@matteomidas638]

​@@Metallllllll667The first one you said. And that's it.

[@Bremmie486]

This made me laugh tho😂 i know this is just a joke. But he is probably working his ass off

[@IceBreakBottle]

So this is what it's like to have a band member who is not struggling and broke

[@Jason-Taylor]

Would love to see a BTS video showing you going through the process of hooking up this rig at a show from connecting the band to the split and plugging into FOH and your rigs. Part 2 about the software would also be awesome! Keep up the great content!!

[@dbwastooshort]

dude a part 2 would be sooo awesome, love these kind of videos!!

[@soundctrllukas]

after spending $ 20.000, please, please stick new labels STRAIGHT on the pannels...

[@cassio_zambotto]

You did it because you can, of course. I believe an artist should always strive for the best, but the main point is that ends must meet, if your band's earnings justify the investment it's a no brainer. That said, in my country that money is half the price of a modest house. We all know we buy music stuff mainly because music is everything in our lives and it matters a lot to keep the progress, more even than things making any sense financially.

[@paulbradshawguitar]

love seeing this sort of stuff, we run something similar however for drums / mics/routing goes straight to FOH and we get a feed sent back to our rack which we can set to taste, admittedly less control, but less cables and with shared backline/drums is potentially quicker /easier by doing this we can get by with an xr18, less channels, and i think a 8u or 10u rack, would love to upgrade to a g4 iem setup at some point, it's a fair bit of coin however

[@vallabhsivaprasad]

PART 2 We need this, this is super interesting

[@wilkopiano]

So majority of the cost of that rack is sennheiser who charge too much anyway and iconnectivity for tracks is nothing to do with iem. That’s a separate budget usually.

[@mikesanchez5218]

Great video, you got a new subscriber

[@adamcogan211]

PART 2!!!!

[@RinnyEin]

Awesome overview of the IEM rig. Curious on what you were using before and definitely interested to see Part 2!

[@Notacet]

Why have a separate unit for splitting the xlr inputs? Some stageboxes support dual ethernet ports, so wouldn’t that be enough? One for IEM mixer, one for front of house

[@RaffaeleSansone]

What is the LD CUE channel? Couldn't find it in the other video either... My best guess is that it's the Light Design cue which is sent in conjunction with the LTC, but your Reaper project didn't seem to send that out either.

[@jjptech]

-Keyan: Why I Spent $20,000 -Me: Hey Guys... gess what I found for 100USD!? yes a XR18!!!, yes yes, the power supply is out, but I know how to repair it!!. Now is working amazing. We have some 25 USD IEMs and 15usd Kz monitors, and it's bee doing wonders to our playing skills

[@noah568ify]

Did you consider the presonus live 32 instead? I use the m32C with a DL16 but just curious Does everyone (guitar and bass) have their own DI boxes to get into the splits? I decided to mix my whole show off my m32c which is sooo much easier than doing splits in small to medium sized venues lol

[@FIN_Der-Otter]

i get IER, i really do - however, not having amps on stage never sounds good. maybe, on an arena tour, with big PAs, but small bands, in small clubs, with even just mid tier PAs always sound weak and thin. especially harder bands doing theirselfs no favor by playing without amps.

[@gwiongriffiths6540]

Great video! Would love to see a video on the software side as well! 😃

[@wilkopiano]

I’ve done a hardwired iem rig for under £400 for 4 mono and 2 stereo in ear personal mixes. you must be dripping to spend more than the cost of most home studios on an IEM rig.😂 the real winners are shure or senheiser who have the monopoly on the world band uhf channels.

[@matt926uk1]

Can’t put a price on your hearing 😸

[@KeyanHoushmandLive]

Could not agree more

[@flixon3795]

please do part 2, I've always been interested in how bands receive their audio, what each band member hears and how the whole thing works

[@DadPlaysBass]

Your band is only 3 guys? You, the bassist and drummer? Where are the other IEM for the other members?

[@aceonwheels2349]

Paused at 0:26 so I can say this… in no way am I going to spend that much on an IEM rig but I’m going to watch the entire video because I’m sure it’s full of knowledge that I will need when I build mine for my actually “small” band. 😂

[@matteomidas638]

All nice except for the crooked labels that on a $20,000 system i really can't stand. Some order please.

[@tearfulplace5015]

i just dont understand how do you acquire the money for this?

[@aja2788]

Could you maybe do another video showing the flow of the signal from beginning to end maybe on a flow chart program or something lol 😅

[@kakao6125]

every sane modern guitarist :

[@KeyanHoushmandLive]

LMAO

[@Pinkybum]

The only issue with not including your splitter with the mixer in the same rack is you have to plug and unplug those 32 + 6? connections every night!

[@oyoyoyubilinegra]

do part 2!

[@miguelbuenoruiz7477]

Great video! Do you also carry your own drum mics and stage XLRs or do you use the venue one's? Couldn't the mics change the gain staging of your IEM mix?

[@KeyanHoushmandLive]

Yes, our FOH Kris brings his own mics and all of the gain staging is set to those mics

[@Tom.Riley.Wav.]

“Black Spaghetti” - Keyan Houshmand 2024 Seriously though this video was amazing.

[@vminator]

Sound guys at small venues are gonna be like WTF man really?

[@migueldiazdrums]

I´d love to get a look at the reaper session

[@fourspiralarms]

sick setup! can we get a detailed video on your reaper session? would love to know how you have things routed, mixed, and whats going where.

[@DEADITEDAN]

Part two yet?

[@trystanmcnab]

A part 2 on the software side would be HUGELY beneficial, taking the time to make these kinds of videos is so cool 🖤✌🏻

[@MartinBergnerGuitar]

We need part 2!!

[@m3m3sis]

part 2, we want more nerdy nerd stuff so definitely software part also!

[@snm1147]

This is great! One of the best build ever on youtube. Would love more videos on those cable management specially on those iem adapter power cable management.

[@__michaelmarino__]

Helllll yeahhhh man, love the rig!

[@eamonnparsons3155]

I'm going to start performing some time either later this year or next year, so these sorts of videos are massively helpful in starting to understand the sorts of things I need to learn about for live performance. Big fan of a clean stage.

[@elireardon]

“Amps are loud”…..

[@Pearly44-nm7kn]

Very pretty and very well done. But, 20K is way too much to spend for what should be a simple set of functions. Clearly a vanity project.

[@XIIMonkeysMusicGroup]

Say you don't know the price of gear without saying it 😂

[@chris_lampard]

Such a sick rig, until the airline loses 1 case… 😧

[@KeyanHoushmandLive]

Hahaha if that was to happen, finding a replacement for only a select few components before a show is much easier than sourcing an entire rig that gets lost because it’s all in 1 case

[@chris_lampard]

@@KeyanHoushmandLive true that! Awesome setup for sure!

[@ernestobenschop6087]

yes , part 2 please

[@Daisyaugustmay]

The wonky labels are insane 🤢

[@Prey.Rock99]

The “small band “ opened for AAL🥸

[@BecomingProductions]

And fronted by a youtuber with access to far more resources, companies, equipment and marketing than most other "small bands". But hey let's not let reality get in the way of some KZbin click bait.

[@josku5]

Who’s AAL?

[@voltaic849]

​@@josku5animals as leaders

[@Bocaj2944]

@@josku5animals as leaders. If you haven’t listened to them, I urge you to do so.

[@mattfury.]

@@josku5Animals As Leaders

[@iConnectivitySupport]

That's pretty. Love color coded backs. This rig is going to serve you really well on tour. How are you splitting the 1 DIN out from the 1U to the 4 on the back? Kenton piece inside or a mioXM? you don't want timecode in your ears?? That's the best way to fall asleep... Redundant Windows setup!! Super rare.

[@SkylerMills]

Showing the softwear slow and srt up along withthe midi coming out to the QC would be very helpful!!! Also the power situation, for example traveling to europe, do you use a step down/ transformer or just an adapter? Cherrs! Love it man.

[@IanReimann]

Do PT.2 please.

[@jaredmkl]

Now you just need some 64's for the rig

[@KeyanHoushmandLive]

no queda dinero :(

[@babyangel_ost]

would love pt2

[@stevevorass]

What if you’re playing a festival and using backline drums? Do you bring your own mic package and put those on the kit even if it’s mic’d up with the house mics? Or do you unplug the house mics and plug them into your snake and send the tails to the sound person? Thanks!

[@paulschoen9940]

cool build. Loved when you said exuberant amount of money instead of exorbitant

[@dylanjastle]

I think exuberant barely works too

[@darthvader386]

Because I can...

[@mael1561]

Amazing video ! Thank you very much for taking the time to explain (and show the backside!). As both sound engineer and musician, this is really great info, as I'am currently in the process of building such rack myself. And I can confirm that as a FOH, what a pleasure to work with musician that are prepared like this ! It's the first time I see a splitted rack such as this one, and the idea is actually quite interesting ! I might take time to think about my rig and see if it would fit my workflow. Just wanted to address something about redundancy. I absolutely understand the idea of having redundancy on midi, computers fail often and its safer to have a backup. But in the end you say "Although there are a lot of things that could go wrong, everything is compartmentalized.". On the audio side of things, absolutely. Less looms : less risk of messing with the inputs, etc. But you only run the whole rack through one power supply, and we know that the second thing that fails after computers are power supply (mostly even before the rack). Why not having a surge protector with dual power supply ? This way you power your rig through two 16A lines, and you shoud be safe if power goes south. On more affordable rigs, I absolutely understand most people wont spend the extra money, but here, why (I mean, if you spent 20000$, maybe the extra 300$ are not so much of an issue) ? Is it the weight it would add to the rack? Or maybe you're touring big enough venues where you can trust the power supply ? Anyway, thanks again, a lot of good things to take !

[@AndrewBanker1]

Fantastic video, and a fantastic set up. I couldn’t agree more about spending the money now. One point though. it does make a difference to the sound front of house. I reducing the bleed from wedges on stage with multiple microphones, it improves the fidelity of the mix substantially.

[@platform1studio610]

its hilarious. you go through redundancy so much then forget about a ups for the main power. dude............................ you need a ups on that bad boy. cool rig dude.

[@rdrblegh]

part 2 please !

[@stevenkambach]

I would love to see the software side! I am a Reaper user and rarely see people use it in this way so I would get a lot of value from that type of video 🙏

[@o.w.sproductions1873]

This channel is a godsend. I was about to give up on music altogether.

[@roupouw7193]

I'm still scratching my head where you or how you did the split with xlrs, the rig is so compact and really cool, would like to know more the back site of it or the routing how you set up the digital mixer. cuz this rig can record any band playing on stage, just what I need! love the video I keep come back to it to build my own your video is so a learning moment you have such knowledge for these you go through with everything. love your work! YES PART 2!

[@SkylerMills]

This makes my rig which is nearing 8Gs look like a hobo tent set up 😂

[@chrissiemilnarskii]

Without sounding like a huge nerd, the cable management is probably the best I’ve ever seen in one of these. Especially that back panel that opens! Colour-coordinated & looks nice too? What an absolute dream!

[@BattousaiMLT]

ridiculously overkill for a 3 piece band playing djent instrumentals. killer set up, but I think this can be done much simpler and lighter.

[@Saitamasensei51]

For anyone in the US looking for a similar quality splitter, Trace Audio makes amazing quality stage boxes and splitters. Can attest.

[@jobelewis6416]

Nice! You should consider putting a multipin connection from split to DL32. Also, any reason for Reaper instead of QLab?

[@capoman1]

18:34 Really cool that you're using Reaper.

[@lukedenniss9496]

How did you find the 535's when you were using them? I used mine for a while before switching yo Linsoul/KZ. I found the 535s to have way too harsh of a high end that was hard to tame

[@Darko.mp3]

Random tiny note about refining/efficiency, colour coding the labels on the splitter (or in general) will make a big difference over time (i.e. put a purple dot on all drum inputs/green for guitars etc)

[@TSOIofficial]

Part 2 please!

[@KeyanHoushmandLive]

Part 2 is uploaded on my channel!

[@paulsmith1052]

Would love to see the DAW/Routing setup - I think that's a huge piece :) Awesome Video and thanks

[@chepss]

What do you for living other than music? You’re blessed to afford these gears

[@josuastangl7140]

As you chose the iconnectivity interface for it's built in redundancy system, do you plan on getting a second computer to take advantage of that?

[@Straightedge63]

small? dude your band is getting huge fast. congrats! dont defend it. it makes sense.

[@carazy123_]

I would love to see how this is routed software side. That’s what seems like magic to me

[@daleonov]

Definitely insterested how your Reaper session is set up!

[@offshot1st]

Honestly man this stuff is so interesting and useful. our lil tech/bassist just built us a cheap rig and we are getting used to running clicks and IEMs as the last time most of us played live was 10 + years ago in shitty tiny pubs and clubs.

[@Mxyaguitar5150]

How beneficial do you think an IEM rig would be if you're playing small shows that don't usually have a FOH person or where the only thing coming from the PA is vocals? I've always wanted to run an IEM rig but most of the venues metal bands play around here are like DIY type venues that usually borrow a PA system from one of the bands playing so there really isn't a monitor mix at all

[@NathanNagel]

If you have a IEM rig, there’s a chance your mixer is going to be the one that runs the whole gig because it’s better than what is at the venue. It can be beneficial so you can actually hear yourself if that an issue for you now. It can still be used with a vocal only PA, you would just have to mic everything for your IEM rig and then only split the vocal to FOH.

[@Known_as_seb]

Would absolutely love to see a software review need some tips on live midi tracks

[@TheButcher0fBlaviken]

Please do a software video!

[@joelmathys1138]

Aren't you worried about phantompower from FOH if you have a passive split? Or do you rely on that and never send from the Midas32?

[@KeyanHoushmandLive]

Each input on the split has isolated transformers, so it won’t matter!

[@OlegAryutkin]

That’s a great rig, looks sweet, high end. My band does the same functionality with a 3U rack Mostly because I’m a freak about optimizing weight.

[@KeyanHoushmandLive]

That’s awesome! Please tell me more about it

[@OlegAryutkin]

@@KeyanHoushmandLivesure, happy to share. It’s based on an RME Babyface Pro audio interface and its built-in digital mixer. It’s tiny, almost fits in a pocket. Hooked up to it via ADAT a Behringer ADA8200 8in/8out port expander, it gives me a total of 10XLR in and 10 XLR out. A laptop sits on top of the rack; hooked to the babyface via USB. The laptop is used to run tracks, click/cues, AND as the keyboard module, so it sends 6 channels down the USB to the RME internal mixer. Sometimes it even runs instrumental tracks when a player is missing. The RME has a nice visual mixer on that laptop, we set up individual mixes for each IEM and output to FOH for keyboards.

[@OlegAryutkin]

@@KeyanHoushmandLiveI’ve realized over time, that all the patch panels, short XLR cables, blanking plates, splitters are 70% of the bulk of the rack and I don’t need them. And like you said in the video - when something goes wrong and needs to be inspected or god forbid re-patched, you gotta dive down the back of the rack on dark stage and usually there’s no time to do it slowly, so it’s a lot of stress. So I thew away all of that.

[@OlegAryutkin]

@@KeyanHoushmandLivemy secret trick is - I don’t have splitters. Why? Our wireless mic receivers have dual outputs, the guitar processors also do, the keyboard/tracks also. So most sound sources have built in splitters, why carry another one. So the only splitter I need is for drum mics. could have one, just 4-8 channels, or simply not. We usually ask the sound guy to give us a stereo drum mix.

[@OlegAryutkin]

@@KeyanHoushmandLiveso we don’t hand a huge XLR snake to the sound engineer, we simply tell them to connect like they would an old school band, but we take parallel outputs from eeach sound source. We tell the sound guy “don’t worry about the stage mix, just give us a drum mix send”, usually it’s just kick/snare because other drums are so loud we can hear them acoustically, no need for extra china cymbal in my mix :)

[@RockYourLive95]

what do you dowhen you get a 4th bandmember?

[@HoaPierre]

software side please

[@milotrix44]

Pleaaaassseee make Part 2!

[@joshtorresfdu6621]

I would like to get into the IEM world. I’m a modern player, and I use QC with a cab but a clean stage where you hearing nothing but a spazzing drummer makes the experience for the people in the front not enjoyable. lol

[@t_separator]

Iem doesn’t mean silent stage. My band does have a iem but still uses cabs on stage. You have the rumble on the floor and your sound clear in your ears

[@thriveimagedesign]

Deluxe Guitars 🤘🏼

[@vladharanich]

Software part!

[@untamablebenjamin]

Would love to see some software content!

[@joesmith5617]

would love to see the software side of things

[@michaelluce3843]

rig rundown pt 2!! Gotta see that reaper session

[@marinoskatsanevas]

Great video mate!

[@KeyanHoushmandLive]

Thank you mate and thanks again for putting this rig together!

[@leorobinsonnn]

part 2 🙏🏻🙏🏻🙏🏻🙏🏻

[@Cacophaton]

Because you can ?

[@zencreates8159]

We need part 2!!

[@DarcyBakerMusic]

Amazing setup Keyan, so sick to see such an in-depth breakdown of the whole system ❤️ keen for a pt2 on the software side if that ever happens

[@KeyanHoushmandLive]

It’s already up on the channel!

[@DarcyBakerMusic]

@@KeyanHoushmandLive yo hell yeah thanks man completely missed it

[@DanAlterGuitar]

Top tier content! 🤓👍😊

[@dougmartinezjr]

Sheesh🔥